Hinged belt fasteners having preset or prestaked staples require two distinct staple setting operations for providing the required low profile for the set staples of the fasteners when installed on the end of a conveyor belt. Applicant's assignee herein provides an Ready Set™ series of staple belt fasteners that have upper and lower plates interconnected by a pair of spaced arcuate hinge loops. The staples are prestaked in apertures of the upper plate member. The first setting operation creates an initial set of the legs of the staples by driving the staples through the apertures of the upper plate member in which they are held, through the belt, and through aligned apertures in the lower plate member of the fasteners, and then against a specially configured recessed anvil surface that starts to bend the staple legs. The final set operation involves applying the drive force to the staple to drive the bent, initial set staple legs against a flat anvil surface so they are further bent to be received in a pocket in the lower fastener member so as not to project out therefrom.
For these different staple setting operations, different anvil configurations are employed as described above. The RS staple belt fasteners are applied to the belt end via the use of two separate tools each having anvils that are specially configured for the operation they perform. The first tool has anvils fixed to a base channel with the anvils having recessed wells that are configured to provide an initial set for the staple legs while the other tool has anvils fixed to another base channel that are configured with flat, horizontally oriented anvil surfaces to provide the staple legs with their final set configuration. Both tools use comb members for aligning the staple legs with the anvils, and guide blocks for guiding a tool, such as either a drive rod or rods from a power staple driver tool or a manually held staple driver that is impacted by hammer blows. The staple driver tool is received in guide bores of the guide block to deliver a drive force to the staples. Both tools also use over-center clamp devices that are actuated to urge the guide blocks down against an upward spring bias to apply a downward clamping force on the upper plate of the belt fasteners so that the belt fasteners and belt end are clamped in the tool with the comb member captured between the guide blocks and the anvils thereunder. Depending on the size of the belt fasteners, the appropriately sized comb member is selected and mounted in the tool with the guide blocks and clamp device then mounted to the tool.
After all of the staple legs on each of the fasteners in a fastener strip are provided with their initial set, the clamp devices are released. The belt end can then be pulled out of the initial set tool and put into the final set tool with the initially set staples being aligned with the final set anvils via an appropriately sized comb member in a manner similar to the initial set tool. After the clamp devices are actuated to clamp the belt end with the fasteners thereon in the tool, the staples are driven via a drive member inserted in bores of the guide blocks to provide a final set to the staple legs. As with the initial set tool, the parts of the final set tool (the comb members, guide blocks and clamp devices) need to be assembled together based on the fastener size. Alternatively, it is known that, because of the time needed to load the belt with the initially set staples into another tool, installers may simply flip the belt over and, using a hammer, deliver hammer blows directly to the initially set staple legs to drive them into the pocket of the lower plates. Thus, in this instance the staples are provided with their final set without the use of an anvil for this purpose.
Another more recently developed applicator tool for staple belt fasteners by applicant's assignee herein employs a single applicator tool for applying the staple belt fasteners to belt ends. This applicator tool also includes guide blocks with clamp devices with the guide blocks having bores adapted to receive the nose end of a power staple driving tool therein. A comb plate is mounted to the tool under the guide blocks. In this tool, the belt does not have to be removed from the tool for performing both the initial and final set driving operations on the staple legs. Instead, the tool includes a handle actuator that is operable to lift the guide blocks and comb plate and to slide anvils that have both initial and final set portions formed thereon into proper alignment with the staple legs depending on the staple setting operation that is to be performed. Nonetheless, as is apparent, each of these tools requires a significant number of parts as well as moving parts increasing their complexity and expense.